Wednesday, May 27, 2026 was the big day we flew to Hawaii!!! None of us had ever been, and we were pretty excited for this adventure. When checking into our flight, I learned that Hawaii has some extra things I'd never encountered on a flight before. First up, we had fill out a mandatory agriculture biosecurity declaration letting Hawaii know that we weren't bringing any animals or fruits or any other agricultural products with us on our trip.
I also learned that there are some exempt items from the checked baggage fee, including your first properly packaged box of pineapples.
We got up at 3:30 am. on Wednesday, May 27. We had originally planned to leave at 4 a.m, but we didn't make it into the car until around 4:20 a.m. Thankfully, I gave us a really good buffer knowing that 4 a.m. was most likely a pipe dream.
We listened to Stick Figure's Hawaii Song to set the tone for our trip.
We parked our car at the Parking Spot, took the shuttle to airport, and checked our luggage, which was the easiest experience to date doing so (other than maybe at Provo Airport). Nice job, Hawaiian Airlines!
We made our way through the tunnel to the B gates. They asked if anyone would be willing to gate check their carry-on luggage since it was a full flight, and since we already had checked luggage that we'd need to wait for in Honolulu, we went ahead and gate checked all our roller bags.
We had a LONG flight to Honolulu. It wasn't the 10 hour flight in the middle of the night to Amsterdam, but 6 hours is still 6 hours. When I booked the flights, I didn't want to pay extra for everyone's seat, but I wanted Brian to have an aisle seat, so I paid for his seat and put Rachel in the middle seat next to him. There was a window seat in the row directly behind Brian that was included in our price, so I grabbed that one for Michael, but then the next available seats together were several rows back. Thankfully, they weren't extra and I booked me in the window seat and Gabe in the middle next to me. After Brian's work trips, I traded Gabe and Rachel's seat.
Gabe was so excited to wear his Hawaii outfit to Hawaii.
I loved that the plane was playing Hawaiian music, and I loved that the restroom sign people were wearing Hawaiian clothes.
Our flight was great except for a few minor mishaps. First, a kid threw up next to Brian at some point in our flight, and some of her vomit got on his pant leg. She was obviously air sick, so we didn't worry about her being contagious and getting him sick, but he was pretty excited to eventually get out of those pants. He saw the vomit coming, so he grabbed a vomit bag from the flight attendant to hurriedly hand to the girl's mom, so despite the vomit, he felt like a hero.
I accidentally packed my drawing pencil bag, which included a compass and some little rulers, as well as my travel charging cable bag. They’re both a similar size and similar color. Because I kept thinking that the pencil bag was my cable bag, somewhere along the way, I accidentally lost my charging cord bag. Maybe I lost it on the plane. Maybe I lost it in the airport. Probably on the plane. I guess we'll never know.
It was fun flying over the ocean and looking down at the clouds and just seeing blue everywhere. It looked like the sky, but it was the ocean! It got really exciting when we finally made it above the Hawaiian Islands, and even more exciting when we circled Oahu for our final approach and landing in Honolulu! It was so beautiful!
We landed, got off the plane, went to the bathroom, and then headed to baggage claim. We spotted this sign on the way, and I had to stop and take a picture. We were all so excited to be in Hawaii!!!
We got our luggage and then made our way to the rental car counter to pick up our car. We had reserved a full size sedan, and as the guy was pulling up our reservation, Brian said, "If you upgraded us, I wouldn't be sad." The guy said, "How about a jeep?" "Does it have more trunk space than the sedan. The guy said, "Definitely" so we took him up on his offer. We got all our stuff packed into the back of the jeep and then headed towards Pearl Harbor, stopping at McDonalds for lunch on the way for convenience and speed.
We found a decent parking spot at Pearl Harbor, paid for our parking, and following the advice of someone who worked at Pearl Harbor, we hauled all of our luggage out of the car to check in at their luggage lockers. Before doing that, Rachel and Brian changed into shorts, and the boys and I waited in the long luggage check line. We finally got all our luggage and backpacks safely stored, and then we got on the shuttle for Ford Island to hit up the museums over there.
Our first stop was the USS Missouri. This is the ship where they Allied Forces and Japan signed the treaty ending World War II.
After we got our tickets, we saw this statue of the famous photograph, and Brian and I HAD to try to recreate it.
We also grabbed some sunscreen from the gift shop because lots of people said to buy sunscreen in Hawaii since they are very particular about what sunscreens they allow in the water. The sunscreen that was available was mineral, and it would NOT rub in. Brian and I looked like ghosts!
Kids didn’t want to do a tour, so we explored the ship backwards. We found out Rachel has a bit of anxiety below decks on ships–a Navy career is not in her future.
We got to see the spot where a Kamakazi pilot hit the ship as he crashed on deck, and along those lines, we learned how the crew members under the direction of the captain, honor that Kamakazi pilot with a burial at sea, and how the U.S. navy men made a Japanese flag to wrap his body in.
The Gun Show:
We explored the interior areas of the ship, including displays about the Kamikaze fighter, artifacts and displays about the U.S.S. Missouri during the war, the cafeteria, the living quarters of both officers and enlisted men (while saying, "If you choose to join the military, do it as an officer!), briefing rooms, and the dental lab.
We made our way to back up to the main deck, took some more pictures in front of the big guns, posed for some Titanic pictures, practiced shooting the guns on deck, listened to one of the tour guides telling the story of the treaty being signed, and then we saw the spot where they officially signed the treaty to end WW2.
We finally made our way off the battleship, and took more photos on our way off.
We did a quick perusal of the gift shop.
And Brian and I attempted the statue picture one more time. I think we finally got it mostly there this time.
Brian shined the boys shoes--er, slides.
We took advantage of more photo ops.
Then we got sat in the queue to catch the bus and head to the Aviation Museum. We passed the Memorial for the U.S.S. Oklahoma on the bus. It's just outside the entrance to the U.S.S. Missouri.
The Pearl Harbor Aviation Museum was amazing! We saw saw Japanese WW2 planes along with U.S. WW2 planes. Michael was like a kid in a candy shop!
Here's Michael in front of a replica of one of Doolittle's Raiders' Planes, the Ruptured Duck. I thought it was an original until my brother, Cal, who I had been texting pictures to, said, "They brought it back from China?" Oh yeah, I had forgotten that all the raiders had to ditch their planes in China because they ran out of fuel. They did use this plane in movies though.
The museum had a flight simulator, and we decided to let the kids do it. Brian graciously let me be the hero and offer the chance to them. Michael flew with Rachel, and Gabe got to fly himself. Everyone had giggles the entire time. The best was watching them on the monitor when they were upside down because the video showed them right side up, but Rachel's hair was sticking straight up and she was screaming.
Brian and I loved hearing Rachel's screams of delight and their ear to ear grins.
The whole experience breathed new life into our very tired children--and us if we're being honest.
The kids are always great sports about posing for a picture, it helped that the boys loved seeing these planes.
And we found another amazing photo op before leaving that part of the museum. Rachel's is very good,
but Gabe's is most excellent.
From there, we made our way over to the Hanger. We saw more planes on the way.
After walking past all these amazing planes, we got to see the aircraft hangar that still has the bullet holes from Dec 7, 1941. It was crazy seeing them!
We got to see more cool planes
Including this giant plane called the Swamp Ghost.
Look how massive it is! This World War II Boeing B-17E Flying Fortress bomber crash-landed in a swamp in New Guinea back in 1942. Australian military pilots found it in 1972 while flying above it in a helicopter, and apparently it looked a little spooky from the air, thus earning its name. Someone managed to lift it from the swamp, mostly intact, in 2006.
One of our favorite things about the day was they let us dress up in pilot jumpsuits and take photos with one of the planes, including sitting in the cockpit.
The attendent also let us take photos in our jumpsuits next to the plane, and even took pictures of our whole group by it.
With the hanger mostly empty, I filmed everyone walking with some swagger towards me in slow motion. We were trying to recreate a sketch from Studio C where pilots are walking to their planes in order to save the world, but one guy just walks really strangely. Everyone took a turn being the weird walker, and we laughed and laughed before finally returning the jumpsuits.
We took the bus back to the Visitor's Center, taking one last shot inside the circle that marked the diameter of the onsite submarine. Here I am taking the photo.
And here's the photo I took.
Rachel and I loved the flowers.
After getting our luggage and getting back to the car, we started to head to Laie, stopping at Taco Bell on the way. I know, but we were hungry (possibly hangry), and we just needed to eat something quick.
The drive was so incredibly gorgeous! The mountains were really steep but completely covered in bushes, trees, and flowers. I felt bad that Brian had to drive and didn't get to just gape at the beautiful scenery.
We made it to our vacation rental and dropped off luggage before we walked to a beach nearby. It was beautiful!
We all waded in the water. As expected, Michael was wading in the water and eventually made it out to where the water was almost to his collarbone surgery mark. Thankfully, he pulled back and then walked back to the condo we were renting.
At one point, Rachel found us complaining about pain in her foot. She'd either got bit or stung by something in the water. We were a bit concerned, and so we flagged down a senior missionary couple who were taking a walk on the beach to ask what might have caused it. They said it was most likely a Portuguese Man-of-war, a type of jellyfish that really like the eastern side of the island, especially during a full moon cycle. They literally said to rub dry sand over it to remove any lingering stingers, and let us know that the sting was annoying but not lethal.
By this point, we were ready to head back and get everyone in bed. We kept trying to get Gabe out of water. He was completely immersed by that point, even though he was in regular clothes, having a blast. While trying to get him out of the water, Gabe also got stung by a jellyfish. He cried and screamed like he was dying. When we told him it was most likely a jellyfish that stung him, he cried even harder, exclaiming, "Shouldn't we be going to the hospital?!!" Truthfully, if the missionaries hadn't told us the stings wouldn't cause lasting damage, I would have been thinking the same thing. We tried to reassure him, but he was incredibly tired (Hawaii is 4 hours behind Utah) and claimed to be paralyzed from the sting. Brian carried him most of the way back to the house.
A mama cat and and her kittens live at our rental property, and the kids spent a lot of time snuggling them. I was delighted to see that there are wild chickens everywhere.
We finally got everyone showered, and we tried to get all the extra beds set up and ready for Lara and her crew to arrive later that night. We finally got the kids in bed, and I had a major meltdown before bed when I realized that my charging cables got left either on the plane or in the Salt Lake Airport. I was especially concerned about how I was going to charge my watch. Being tired really didn't help anything, and it was way past my Mountain Standard Time Bedtime. Brian saved the day by heading out to CVS to find a charging station for all my things, even though the CVS folks were jerks to him about it. (Apparently he got there right before closing time, but it's their fault for not updating their hours online). I crashed in room with girls since Ben was planning to stay with us the next night, and I had volunteered to sleep with all the girls so Ben could sleep in the room with Brian.
Lara and Greg arrived, and everyone crashed hard.
